book peek - march 14, 2013 - preview
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Reviews of A Brief Hour of Beauty-Ammu Nair; What If They Knew?-Lisa L. Payne; Fix Your Problems The Tenali Raman Way-Vishal Goyal; Damn Good Advice-George Lois; 9 Things Successful People Do Differently-Heidi Grant Halvorson; Bookie Gambler Fixer Spy-Ed Hawkins. Also: Tales of a Journalist, Bureaucrat, Spy-Som Nath Dhar; Internal Communications-Aniisu K. Verghese; You Can Change Your Life-Rob Yeung; The Cripple and His Talismans-Anosh Irani; Infinite Verse-Amit Khanna; The Hunger Angel-Herta Müller.TRANSCRIPT
March 14, 2013 2 Book Peek
Contents of Book Peek dated March 14, 2013
Reviews
‘A Brief Hour of Beauty’ by Ammu Nair - Landmark
‘What If They Knew? Secrets of an impressive woman’ by Lisa L. Payne
‘Fix Your Problems: The Tenali Raman Way’ by Vishal Goyal
‘Damn Good Advice (for people with talent)’ by George Lois
‘9 Things Successful People Do Differently’ by Heidi Grant Halvorson
‘Bookie Gambler Fixer Spy: A journey to the heart of cricket’s
underworld’ by Ed Hawkins
New arrivals – From Harper, Sage
Short snatches
‘Tales of a Journalist, Bureaucrat, Spy: From Partition to Operation
Bluestar’ by Som Nath Dhar – Harper
‘Internal Communications: Insights, practices, and models’ by Aniisu
K. Verghese - Sage
‘You Can Change Your Life: Easy steps to getting what you want’ by
Rob Yeung - Macmillan
‘The Cripple and His Talismans’ by Anosh Irani – Fourth Estate
(Harper)
‘Infinite Verse’ by Amit Khanna – Harper
‘The Hunger Angel’ by Herta Müller - Landmark
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Remembering Clint
Ammu Nair’s ‘A Brief Hour of Beauty’ (Landmark) is a
poignant biography of Edmund Thomas Clint, who died
before he was seven years old. But before bidding the final
bye, Clint had drawn more than 25,000 pictures, ‘many of
which doyens of art hail as the work of a genius.’
As soon as he started crawling, Clint began to draw,
narrates Nair. “His parents’ eyes sparkle with delight and
tender love when they relate the story of Clint’s debut
drawing. He was about six months old and could crawl on
his belly…” Using pieces of brick lying on the floor, Clint drew perfect circles
on the floor, the parents reminisce. And soon, he would fill empty spaces
with an astounding variety of shapes and shades…
His parents, Chinnamma and Joseph, used to take Clint for evening walks,
at times all the way up to Venduruthi Palam, the bridge that stretches
between Willingdon Island and mainland Kochi, the author recounts. “Clint
loved to gaze at the backwaters and listen to the gentle sloshing of water on
the pillars below the pier. One day, Chinnamma and Clint hired a boat and
went all the way to the port at the mouth of the river. Clint saw ships
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anchored along the port… Clint came home and drew seagulls flying low
over fishing boats, numerous ships, ferries, and the port.”
Those were days before the television made its appearance in Kochi and, so,
Clint’s sources of knowledge were books, magazines such as World
Magazine published by National Geographic Society, and nature. “The
glossy pages of the magazine with its stunning photographs gave him rare
peeks into the wild. The untamed nature and its denizens aroused respect
and an insatiable inquisitiveness in his heart.” Life was beautiful and as
perfect as the images that sprang from Clint’s inexhaustible imagination,
notes Nair. “But in the unfathomable depths of cosmic design, a cataclysmic
change was taking place for this small, happy family.”
Two months short of his third birthday, Clint fell sick with diarrhoea, and
Chinnamma took him to a nearby hospital, where the doctor gave him
medicines. “On the way back home, they stopped at Balu’s place. A mother
of twelve children, Balu’s mother, commented, ‘Don’t rush him to the
hospital for a minor ailment like this! Warm buttermilk with a pinch of
crushed cumin and spluttered mustard seeds is the best remedy for
diarrhoea.’ But Clint was already feeling better. With the kind of clarity and
wisdom only hindsight grants, Chinnamma and Joseph regret ignoring her
home remedy…” Poignant read.
March 14, 2013 5 Book Peek
Authentic selves
When we throw out the masks that have been hiding our
authentic selves, we also let go of the pain and misery they
have caused, writes Lisa L. Payne in ‘What If They Knew?
Secrets of an impressive woman.’ That is the way to
empowerment, she feels.
“Right now, I know who I am and what success means to
me. I fully acknowledge my core values and incorporate
them into my daily life as an expression of my authentic
self. I am crystal clear about what I want my life to look like
and I am committed to making the changes to how I am being and what I
am doing so I create a life that inspires me every day.”
The book of ‘confessions’ by different women, beginning with ‘I am a liar,’ by
Lucy, 32. The lying started at a very young age, just trying to be the best
little girl, says Lucy. “I figured out very early on that my parents would like
a good girl much more than a bad girl and so I fashioned my entire life
around pleasing them… even if it meant telling lies. The thing is: once you
start telling lies, it is much easier to keep going than to confess and speak
the truth.”
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And the habit continued at work, too, where Lucy would tell lies about her
abilities, take on projects for which she was not qualified, and put on the
face of the ultimate success story. In reality, she rues, she was fabricating a
life that had no meaning to her, winning the favour of her bosses, at the
expense of her own integrity and self-esteem. Sadly, she never felt worthy of
praise that she received, even when it was clear – in black and white – that
she had achieved particular goals; she did not feel worthy because a
lifetime of lying had left her feeling like ‘the real me’ could not possibly be
good enough! In a chapter titled ‘I am abused,’ you meet Abby, 29, who
recounts how her husband first hit her when she came home an hour late
after an evening hen party at one of her girlfriends’ houses. The straw that
broke the camel’s back was the vacation that never happened.
The first part of the book is about the negatives, ranging from the smoker to
the shopaholic, procrastinator to thief. But the second part is all the positive
side, starting with, ‘I have courage,’ of Cathy, 36. “After my marriage of 12
years ended, I look upon the clean slate that is my future and get very
excited. Well, I was scared to death… but only momentarily; the opportunity
to tap into the reserve of courage that had been growing for 36 years is now
upon me and I intend to follow through,” says Cathy.
Collection of sensitivities.
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‘Clifton Bridge: Stories of innocence and experience from Pakistan’ by Irshad
AbdulKadir – Harper
‘Legends of Halahala’ by Appupen – Harper
Address for sending review copies of new books
New arrivals
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‘Business & Community: The story of corporate social responsibility in India’
by Pushpa Sundar – Sage
New arrival: Business & Community
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Published by: Shrinikethan, Chennai http://bit.ly/ShriMap
Edited by: D. Murali http://bit.ly/dMurali http://bit.ly/TopTalk
March 14, 2013